


Not Just These Shadows

by zillah975



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Apocalypse, Dean's Amulet, Dubious Consent, Forced Prostitution, Impala, M/M, Other, Rescue, Self-Sacrifice, Sibling Incest, Tense Shifts, The Epic Love of Sam and Dean
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2008-01-06
Updated: 2008-01-05
Packaged: 2017-10-17 18:41:54
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 2
Words: 12,622
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/180018
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/zillah975/pseuds/zillah975
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Everyone knew Dean was going to Hell, and they thought they knew why. Everyone knows Sam will try to get him back, but what happens next isn't what any of them would have expected. While Bobby and Ellen search for a way to avert the apocalypse, Sam and Dean don't realize they're on the verge of triggering it. And when you're dealing with gods and devils, things are never quite as they seem.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Not Just These Shadows

**Author's Note:**

> Written for the [Demon Jesus 100](http://community.livejournal.com/sammessiah/31099.html) Prompt: #4: "For now we see through a glass, darkly."

_  
8 Love doth never fail; and whether there be prophecies, they shall fail; whether tongues, they shall cease; whether knowledge, it shall vanish away;  
9 for in part we know, and in part we prophecy;  
10 and when that which is perfect may come, then that which is in part shall be done away.  
11 When I was a child, I spake as a child, I understood as a child, I thought as a child: but when I became a man, I put away childish things.  
12 For now we see through a glass, darkly; but then face to face: now I know in part; but then shall I know even as also I am known;  
13 and now there doth remain faith, hope, love — these three; and the greatest of these is love.   
_

  
_  
1 Corinthians xiii.   
_   


 

1.

Dean doesn't bother fighting as the demons hustle him through the palace hallways. It's not what he expected, not at _all_. Oh, sure, the glimpses he's seen of Hell through the windows and open doorways are all fire and ash and torn flesh and screaming, chains and hooks and keen-edged knives wielded by things that would make the most seasoned hunter puke all over his boots, which Dean has now done several times.

But here inside the palace it's just...hot. Smells like wet stone and ash. And apart from the burns where the demons have touched him, Dean's in as good shape now as he'd been when the crossroads demon had come for him. His amulet's missing, and that pisses him off. He hopes maybe it just fell off when the demon snatched him and Sam's got it. If he'd been thinking, he'd have given it back to Sam before the demon had come for him, but it's been so much a part of him for so long that he just didn't. He wishes he knew for sure that Sam had it.

The demons stop at a pair of double doors, three times the height of a man and adorned with human heads that watch them mutely, gagged with red-hot steel.

"Kneel," one of the demons snarls, shoving Dean down, and Dean winces when his knees hit the stone.

"Whatever," he mutters, but his voice is shaking. "Can we just get on with this?"

"You'll show respect to your new master," the second demon says, and shoves Dean's head to the floor, pins him there beneath his clawed foot.

The sound of the doors opening is like the hollow screams of old men, and Dean bites back a comment about needing some WD-40. The second demon grabs him by the scruff of the neck and strides forward, and Dean has to scramble on his knees to keep up. All he can see is the stone floor and the reflection of fire, until the demon stops at the foot of a black dais. Glass, maybe, Dean thinks, or obsidian.

"Well, finally. Jesus, it took you long enough," comes a voice from the throne, and Dean's heart stops.

"No," he whispers. "No. No, I left you upstairs."

Sam laughs, and the worst thing so far, Dean thinks, is that the laugh really is Sam's, big and full and genuine. It sounds like Sam. Just like Sam.

"Let him up," Sam says. The demons step back and Dean pushes to his knees, looks up at his brother on the black throne. "Time works differently down here. A lot of things do."

Dean shakes his head. "What the hell? No, no way." He shoves to his feet. "This is one lame trick. You think I won't know my own brother? Show your real face, you son of a bitch."

"You know I told you the crossroads demon had a boss," Sam goes on, as if Dean hadn't even spoken, "who wanted your soul so badly he'd do anything to keep it?" He stands up, starts down the dais. "Can you think of a single person, anywhere, who would ever want _you_ that badly, except me?"

Dean's heart lurches sickly and re-starts, thudding frantically against his chest like it's trying to escape, like it can't be in the same room with whatever's coming towards him.

"I was here for an age when I died, Dean," Sam says. "At first I told Azazel to go screw himself, of course. 'You killed our mom, you killed Jessica,'" he whines, fluttering his hands. "But the longer I was down here, knowing that I would _never_ see you again.... Well, I went a little crazy," he says at last. "'Course I forgot it all once I was back, and honestly, a lot of stuff's pretty hazy these days." He chuckles, dimpling, and strokes Dean's hair. "But that's why I could never break the deal," he says while Dean doubles over, retching. "I made it."

 

2.

The air was thin and damp, smelled of rain when Sam regained consciousness. His face was wet; he wiped his hand across his cheek and it came away bloody. He winced when he rolled to his knees, dirt ground into his jeans and blood still seeping through from underneath, and he struggled to his feet. There was no one nearby but the body of the girl the demon had possessed, slim and lying half in the road, dirt caking her dark hair and her dress rucked up around her thighs.

"Dean!" he called, his resonant voice muffled by the gray morning mist. "Dean!"

There was no answer. He hadn't expected one. The demon arrived a year to the minute after the deal had been struck, and hadn't even left a body to bury or burn.

"Dean!"

The girl stirred. Alive, then, though Sam wasn't sure that would be a blessing for her. He crouched beside her. "Hey," he said, and touched her arm. "Hey."

Her eyes flew open and she gasped, scrambling away from him and her breath coming too fast. Scratches on her legs, dust. "What— what—"

"Hey," Sam said, spreading his hands. "You're going to be okay." It wasn't true, but what else could he say?

"What the hell was that?" she asked, her voice torn at the edges. There was blood on her chin; he hadn't noticed it before. A smear like a comma, or a question mark. "I was — what—"

Sam kept his tone soft. "What do you remember?" he asked.

"How did I get here?" Her eyes were wild.

"She brought you here," Sam said. "The demon."

She stared at him. "You're crazy."

He snorted a soft laugh. "No, we both just wish I were. What's your name?"

Her breath was hitching, her gaze darting around frantically. "Alice," she said. "Alice. I'm Alice, I'm dreaming, I'm— this is still the nightmare."

"You're not dreaming," he said. "I promise."

"You looked in a mirror lately?" she asked, jerking her chin at him. "I sure as fuck hope I'm dreaming."

"You...." The back of his neck went cold, and he stood up and walked to the Impala, his heart pounding. In the side view mirror, though, all he saw was himself blinking back at him. His cheek was scraped bloody, and he had a cut over his eye, but no horns, no yellow eyes.

He took a breath. "Okay. Alice," he said, walking back to her. "You need a doctor. Let me—"

"Where's your brother?" Her eyes snapped to his face. "He looks all wrong, shattered glass, all edges and bleeding."

Sam's heart stuttered. "You can see him?" he asked. "Where is he?"

She inched back further back, not looking at him. "In part we know, and in part we prophecy," she muttered, tugging her hair over her face. "When that which is perfect may come, that which is in part will fall away. Are you perfect, Sammy?" she asked, looking up at him. Dust streaked her skin. "Perfect Sammy. We prophecy in part and we know in part, but love never ever fails. He loves you no matter what you do."

 

3.

Bobby calls Ellen as soon as he sees the signs. "Look, just get here, okay?" he says, looking out the window. The sky is black with crows. "Things are about to get real bad."

It's a couple of months since Dean's been gone, and two weeks since the last hunter tried to kill Sam Winchester. Nothing's been heard from Sam since, though the hunter failed. Bobby's tried all three cell numbers, Sam and Dean and even John, but John's has finally been cut off and Sam's and Dean's both go to voice mail. He still tries sometimes, and he'll punch anyone who says maybe he just wants to hear their voices.

Ellen arrives in the dim morning, the throaty rumble of her truck low over the dogs' barking. Bobby goes out to meet her. "What's so all-fired urgent about this, Bobby?" she asks, slinging her duffle off her shoulder.

Bobby takes it and heads inside, Ellen following. "Something's coming down. There's all kinds of demonic activity," he says. "But more than that, there's omens, portents. Things I didn't think I'd ever see." He drops her bag on the couch and nods towards the kitchen. "Get you some coffee?"

"Yeah," she says, and nods. "You got any whiskey for it?"

Bobby laughs, and Ellen smiles.

"Nah, forget the whiskey," she says. "Too early."

Bobby huffs a breath. "Wait'll you hear what I have to say, and then decide if it's too early."

 

"But what does all this mean, Bobby?" Ellen asks. They're starting the second pot of coffee and her head is swimming with what seems like a whirlwind of random facts, weird news stories, unconnected acts of tragic violence. "Remember now, I was married to a hunter, I never was one."

Bobby nods as he gets out the tin of Folger's. "You know there's a lot of stories, a lot of prophecies in human history about the apocalypse, Armageddon, whatever you want to call it." Bobby measures scoops into the coffee pot, his back to Ellen. "Revelations is just one, there are a lot that didn't catch on so well."

"Yeah, I know," Ellen says, watching him. "All kindsa ways for the world to end. Most hunters know all of 'em."

Bobby shakes his head, pouring water into the reservoir. "Not all of 'em," he says. He hits the brew button and turns around. "In the thirteenth century B.C.," he begins, "there was a little backwater religion in Assyria, kind of on the cusp of Mesopotamian and ancient Semitic religions. According to their mythology, the end of the world would come down to two brothers, sons of a goddess of water and life, what may have been their equivalent of Tiamat. But when the first son was born, the god of the underworld saw him and coveted him, and sent a demon to take him, so she promised him a son of his own if he'd leave them both with her to raise."

"Well who was the first boy's father?" Ellen asks.

"Not sure," Bobby answers, "but looks like maybe her brother."

Ellen shakes her head. "Gods are a damn incestuous bunch."

"Hah. Could explain a lot," Bobby says, taking a heavy leather-bound book from one of the stacks on the kitchen table. He opens it, flips to a marked page. "The translation's a little dodgy," he says, offering it to her, "but have a look."

Ellen scans the page, her glance flickering over ancient text and the handwritten translation beside it. "And at the end," she reads, "the sons of the Mother will walk the earth doing battle with evil in the name of the Mother, and the people will call them Savior, and they will call each other Best Beloved, and Brother, and Heart's Blood."

She glances at Bobby, then pulls out a chair and sits down. "But there will be strife in the land of Death," she goes on, "and the Lord of Death will send fire to dog the steps of his son, to drive him home. There he will meet his brother, but he will see him as through a darkened glass, knowing only the darkness in him, and his brother will lose himself in shadow. Their faith will be broken and hope will fail, and when one is cast away forever, the other in his fury will bring forth demons to scourge the earth and claim it for his own, until none walk here but the dead."

Bobby raises his eyebrows. "Any of that sound familiar?"

"Yeah, in about a dozen different ways," Ellen says. "What makes you think these boys are Sam and Dean?"

"Timing's right, for one," Bobby says. "And some of those omens are pretty specific."

"Aw hell, Bobby," Ellen says, leaning back. "All omens are pretty specific and just about any of 'em can apply to any month you open a newspaper. So crows are flocking, and maybe some of 'em are acting a little too Al Hitchcock — could just be some weird strain of bird flu. And when haven't brothers killed each other? That's been going on since Cain and Abel."

"Not so many," Bobby says. "Not like this." The coffeepot mutters and hisses, and Bobby takes a pair of mugs off the tree and turns to pour. "Look, I'm not sayin' it's a sure thing. Just a real funny coincidence that all these things are starting to happen just a couple of weeks after Sam goes missing, last known to be looking for his brother in Hell."

Ellen nods thanks when Bobby pushes her coffee across the table, reminding herself it's all allegory; no one's saying that John was Mary's brother or that Sam and Dean are the sons of a goddess. Even John didn't put Mary on that high a pedestal. "But if this is the one," she says, tapping the book, "then how come we're all still breathing? How come the world's not over-run with demons and... I don't know, zombies or whatever the hell that prophecy's sayin'?"

"I figure it takes a while to do all that faith breaking and hope failing," Bobby answers. "And if either of those boys could see even a shadow of the other, don't you think he'd be real hard pressed to cast him away at all? We might have some time. Or," he goes on, "I might be all wrong about all of this. Prophecies are damned slippery things, and they never tell the whole story."

Ellen cups her coffee in her hands, warming them. "Well," she says finally. "Assuming you're right, how do we make it not happen?"

Bobby gives her a crooked smile. "That's what you're gonna help me figure out."

 

4.

Dean's sitting — sulking, Sam insists — on what passes for his bed, silk blankets on a stone that's uncomfortably hot from the fires below. At least he can't hear the screams of the damned here in Sam's room, just the wet sounds of the demon currently sucking Sam off, but the iron bars of his cage are hot enough to burn if he touches them. He's dripping with sweat, and it's had him spending the last couple of hours trying to figure out how he can sweat if he's dead. How he can feel pain, feel every cut, every bite, every lash, every bruise, if he's dead. Every touch of his brother's hand, every kiss, every slap, every inch of Sam's cock sliding into his body — a body which should, by all rights, have been burned to ash as soon as Sam woke up and found him dead at the center of the crossroads. How his cock can be stiff and aching like this if he's dead.

He remembers hearing that hanged men sometimes pop wood when they die, so maybe that's it. His dead dick now has a dead erection from watching his dead brother get sucked off by a demon. He twists his hands, pinned painfully high behind his back by nothing but Sam's desire for it, and Sam lets out an explosive sigh. "Dean, for fuck's sake, you're giving me a headache, stop thinking so loud."

"Hey, not my idea to be roomies," Dean answers. "I was happy in the kennel. And it's freakin' hot in here, dude, turn on the A/C."

"Ha ha," Sam says. "You're wearing jeans, boots, a tee-shirt, a flannel shirt, and a denim jacket in Hell, Dean. Overdressed much? Take something off."

Dean rolls his eyes, and Sam glares at him. "Sammy, I can't move, remember? And whose fault is that?"

"Yours," Sam says, "for trying to kill me last time we did this. Christ, you are such a pain in my ass." He sighs again, and the lock of the cage snicks opens, the door swinging wide and clanging against the bars. "Get over here then," he says.

"Don't act like you're doing me such a favor," Dean grumbles, but he does as he's told. It's better than sweltering in the cage. He tells himself that's the only reason.

"I am doing you a favor," Sam says, ruffling his fingers through the demon's fur. It makes a sound like a cat purring, if the cat had been turned inside out. "You've got a great mouth, Dean, but you're only human. These things," and his fingers tighten in the ruddy pelt of the demon. "They give new meaning to the term 'deep throat.'"

Dean shoots the demon a speculative look, then shudders theatrically. "If you like the type, I guess," he says, and Sam lashes out, slapping him hard enough to make his ears ring and knock him off balance. He stumbles and thuds into the wall, and tiny needle-sharp teeth embedded in it nip at him.

"Watch your mouth," Sam admonishes. "You'll hurt its feelings."

"This," Dean says, nodding at the wall as he regains his balance. The sleeve of his jacket is torn. "This is why I don't take something off. Jeez, Sammy, you really oughta fire your decorator."

He doesn't know why he still goads Sam this way. At first it had been habit, but after a while, when he started realizing just how fucked up things had gotten, it was in hopes of catching him off guard and solving all their problems.

That plan had failed spectacularly. And now...well, it _is_ Hell. Pretty much the only time Dean's not in some kind of pain is when he's in bed with Sam. And even then...but that's a different kind of pain, and it never goes away.

"Look at this," Sam says. The demon's forked tongue is twined around Sam's cock, stroking, one tip teasing a drop of precome from the tip. "If you could do this, I'd chain you to the goddamned bed."

"Lucky for me I can't do that," Dean says.

"I could have your tongue split down the middle."

Fear spikes in Dean's chest. "Aw, Sammy," he says, taking a step back, "don't be like that."

Sam shoves the demon away. "Get out," he hisses at it, and it leaps from the bed and scurries for the door.

When it's gone he turns back to Dean, tucking one arm behind his head. "I'm too easy on you," he says. "You made your deal, you should be in the Pit. I'm breaking the rules, keeping you here."

Dean fidgets, twisting his fingers together. He wishes Sam would let his arms go. "So why do you?"

Sam smiles, and his eyes flash fire. "Because you're my brother, Dean," he says, sarcasm heavy in his voice. "Take your clothes off."

Dean flushes red, his arms suddenly un-pinned, and he rolls his shoulders, hissing as he works out the stiffness.

Sam laughs. "You've got balls, blushing like that after everything you've done. All those women, all those men. Everything you wanted to do, to your little brother, when you were alive."

"I didn't," Dean hisses. But he's heard this from Sam so many times, and he's getting to where he can't remember if it's a lie or not.

"Oh, you repressed it like crazy," Sam says. "It probably would've killed you if you'd known about it, but it was there. Now quit stalling."

Dean starts unbuttoning his shirt, and the glint in Sam's eyes is like a distant wildfire now. "I'm a god, Dean," he says. "I can do what I want. I can make _you_ do what I want." He smiles, spreading his legs wide. "And if you're very good," he says, "I'll fuck your mouth so hard you choke. I know how hot that gets you."

Dean grimaces, but keeps undressing, still trying to figure out how he can be dead and still feel every glance like a touch, every touch like a kiss, every kiss like Sam plunging deep into him and murmuring obscenities in his ear. How he can feel if he's dead, and how he can hate Sam so much and still want him so damned badly. Everything from before is fading, life like a distant flicker of hope and he can't catch memories of things he thought he once knew, but he knows he loved Sam more than life, more than death, more than forever, and part of him still does.

He supposes 'damned' is the operative word. The cool sheets are silky under his raw and bloodied knees when he climbs up onto the big bed, and Sam watches him with an expression he can't read.

 

5.

When Sam dropped Alice off at the hospital on his way out of town, she was still rambling in broken sentences about the demon and his brother and the halls of Hell. It tore at him to leave her there, knowing that if he could just get sense out of her she might be able to help him. But after the first night when she'd woken him up six times — wandering out into the parking lot in nothing but one of his tee-shirts and a pair of boxer shorts, and he'd had to coax her back in while the guy in the room next door peered at them through the crack in his curtains — he figured there wasn't any way he could keep her with him. She needed a doctor anyway, and he wasn't getting anything from her that he could use.

He holed up in a motel room outside Kingman, Arizona, and got to work. After all, the deal didn't say he couldn't get Dean back — nothing in the terms said how long the demon got to keep him. And others had made it out before.

"Persephone, Alceste, Tammuz. Eurydice would've if Orpheus just hadn't looked back," Sam muttered, hunched over his laptop.

"Look, it ain't that easy, Sam," Bobby answered, his voice tinny through the bad connection. Sam switched the phone to his other ear and grabbed the mouse, half listening. "Those were gods. You can't just waltz into Hell and demand him back, they'll chain you up beside him and take you apart while he watches."

"Yeah," Sam answered. "Yeah, I know, humans can't generally get out of Hell without divine help. But I'm not really human, am I."

"Don't do that," Bobby snapped. "I don't care what Yellow-eyes did to you when you were a baby, you're as human as I am now. Don't even think it."

Wincing at Bobby's tone, Sam rubbed his eyes. "Look, I just.... I know there's a way to get him back. There has to be."

"If there's a way, we'll find it," Bobby said gently. "But that isn't it."

Sam sighed. Bobby sounded so sure, and he was the demon expert, after all. Sam was just tired, and scared, and alone. "Yeah," he said at last. "Yeah, okay."

 

The motel had a bar attached to it with a couple of beat-up pool tables and a clientele that ran towards beer bellies and motorcycle boots. Neon signs in the window advertised Budweiser and Heineken and Miller, and when he walked in it was to the scratchy sound of an honest-to-god 45 RPM recording of "Gimme Three Steps" playing on an old jukebox. He settled himself onto a bar stool and ordered a beer and a shot, feeling at home for the first time in weeks.

He was on his fourth shot with a fresh beer waiting, and thinking maybe it was time to leave, and that maybe he should've left two shots ago, when someone sidled up and slid onto the stool next to him. No way not to notice him, skin like polished walnut, satiny smooth, dark as his eyes. White shirt that the light seemed to cling to, and a shock of white hair, cheekbones smooth and sweet as the curve of a woman's hips, a wide mouth that looked like it was made to laugh. The scent of crocuses hovered around him.

Sam ignored him anyway.

After a while, the stranger leaned close. "You're wasting time," he murmured. "Things are getting worse, and the longer you sit around on your messianic butt, the worse they're going to get."

Sam wobbled as he swung around to look at him. "Excuse me?"

Eyes flashed silver, and the angel smiled. "You're wasting time," he said again. "You started this, after all. If you stop now, Dean suffers for nothing."

Sam's heart lurched. "Dean— What do you mean, _I_ started—"

But the angel put his finger to Sam's mouth, and Sam's voice stopped in his throat. "Everything serves the plan, Sam," the angel murmured. His skin was smooth, and warm. "Even Azazel. Even you. Don't you understand that? He can choose another if you refuse, but it'll take a generation, and I'm not sure humanity has that long."

Sam shook his head and the room spun. "But... if everything serves the plan, then humanity's got nothing to worry about."

The angel smiled, and Sam was not reassured.

"You can refuse the request, of course," the angel went on. "I always thought free will was a bad idea, but He insisted, so yes, you can say no. And when you die, you'll rise to heaven and spend eternity in glory knowing that you're separated forever from Dean, while he's forever in torment."

Sam gulped in air, shaking his head. "Hell _has_ a ruler. Azazel was just a — I don't know, usurper, whatever, so what about Lucifer? 'Cause you can't tell me," he said, his voice too loud, "you can't tell me that the demon Dean shot in Wyoming was Lucifer."

"No," the angel answered, a smile like an indulgent mother. "No, angels have free will as well, and the Morningstar exercised his. We have not seen him since before your father's father was born." The shimmer in the air around the angel's shoulders seemed to droop. "Azazel wanted to take his place," he went on, "but you and your brother put an end to that, and for that," he added, "God thanks you. Azazel would have burned the world to ash."

Sam sat there in silence, moments stretching into minutes as he stared helplessly at his unwanted drink. The bartender seemed oblivious to them, wiping down glasses at the far end of the bar. Finally he shook his head. "I'm drunk," he said, pushing away from the bar. His nose was stinging and his throat was tight, and he needed to get out of there. He glanced at the apparition beside him, then shook his head again, and when he laughed, it sounded like a sob.

"Samuel," the angel said, and Sam turned to him, the room swimming and bright. Silver eyes shone soft as the angel leaned close and brushed his lips over Sam's, a kiss of bird wings. "Remember Judas," the angel murmured. "Sometimes we have to sacrifice everything so others can be saved."

When the angel drew back, Sam's head was clear. "There are worse fates than ruling in Hell," the angel said. "Make your choice." And then he was gone.

 

6.

The third time Dean tries to kill Sam, he does it with a steady hand and eyes like ice. Sam's flesh parts at the touch of the blade like any mortal's, slitting open, and he wakes up and grabs Dean's wrist, and his wet laugh is like flesh ripping. "Where did you get this?" he asks, squeezing hard.

"Like I'd tell you," Dean snarls, then chokes on a cry as bones in his wrist snap, and the knife falls.

The door flies open and a pair of demons charge in, and Sam shoves Dean aside and snatches up the knife. His aim is still perfect: it hits the first demon square in the throat, and its eyes flame as it jerks, then burns to ash with a scream. The second demon skids to a stop, wide-eyed. "What do you think you're doing?" Sam snarls.

"We heard noises," the demon answers. Its tail curls between its legs, and it touches the barbed tip anxiously. "We thought you were in danger. We came straight away."

"I'm not in danger," Sam says, glaring at the demon, "but if I had been, you would have been a little bit too late, hmm?"

Cradling his wrist close, Dean watches from where he's fallen as the flow of blood slows, and stops, and Sam's throat seals itself closed with a wet sound. The knife had been made from a silver chalice used for Communion by Pope Leo XIII, blessed by seven priests and inscribed with a benediction of the sacrament; it was supposed to be able to cut Lucifer himself, and kill anything less, and he'd given up his skin, literally, to get it. It had worked great on Maeneth. Dean guesses either Sam's higher on the food chain than he admits, or Pope Leo XIII wasn't as pious as he should've been.

The demon twists its tail between shaking fingers. "Shall I put the pet back in its cage?" it asks.

Sam looks at Dean, and Dean's heart lurches. "No," Sam says softly. "No, he's just looking for attention. I've been neglecting him. Get out."

The door shuts behind the demon as it leaves, and Sam pushes up in bed and swings his feet over the side. "As long as you went to all the trouble of getting in here," he says, and his eyes glint fire, "we might as well have some fun."

"Fun," Dean spits. "You've got one screwed-up idea of fun these days, Sammy." But his cock twitches obediently in response to his brother's glance, and he swallows a groan.

"Wow, Dean," Sam says. "You just don't give up, do you? Still trying to pull off the self-righteous act after everything that's happened. All that whoring around when you were alive, and now what is this, three times you've tried to kill me?" He shakes his head. "I don't know what you think would happen to you if you ever managed it, but you should've left me dead the first time. You're not gonna be able to do it now."

"Not gonna stop trying."

Sam stands up, naked, and ruddy light from the fires washes over him, limning lean muscles and the elegant line of his lifting cock. Dean looks away. Sam is perfected here, so beautiful he makes Dean's breath hitch in his throat, and he comes to Dean, cups Dean's chin, forcing him to look up. His dark hair has fallen across his face, brushes his eyelashes, and there's a hot twist of fear in Dean's belly, heated by lust.

"Do you know where the fornicators go, Dean, and the sodomites?" Sam asks. "They don't get blown around by windstorms or wander a flaming desert, like Dante claimed, at least not anymore." He strokes Dean's cheek, and Dean leans into the touch, closing his eyes. "Hell reflects the world above," Sam murmurs, "and since demons are pretty much consumed with lust — for pain, or sex, for others' misery, or whatever, fornicators and sodomites serve those lusts in Sidonay's whorehouse."

He crouches beside Dean. "That's where you should be right now," he whispers. Fire seems to wreathe his face, flicker in his eyes, behind his lips. "The only reason you're not is because I like having you here, and I'm starting to forget why."

Dean's throat is dry, his voice cracked. "It's my awesome sense of humor, Sammy," he says. "The demons don't make you laugh."

A smile slides across Sam's face, slips away like it isn't sure it's in the right place. "I don't think that's it," he says.

After a moment he snaps his fingers, and the door opens again. "Take him to Sidonay," he orders, standing up. "I want him to see what'll happen to him if he doesn't start behaving himself."

And the fucked-up thing, Dean thinks as the demons drag him to his feet, is how much he still loves Sam, even when he was slitting his throat.

 

7.

Sam had tried everything. A dozen rituals, hoodoo spells, meditation, old magic, but in the end, it wasn't any of that that found Sam his power. In the end, he just reached through his grief and his anger to find the door he'd struggled so hard to keep closed, and when he touched it, it exploded.

 

By the time he called Ruby to him, she already knew what had happened. Her fear was acrid in his mind, rubbing alcohol and shale, and she lingered in the open doorway of the motel room, unable to enter or leave. Behind her the parking lot was deserted, the sky dark.

"Ruby," Sam said, leaning back. Power crackled around him. "Ruby, my little pet demon. You know, for a long time I thought you were more trouble than you're worth. I'm not sure I was wrong."

"I helped you, Sam," she said, "don't forget."

Sam laughed. "Helped me? Well," he said, remembering the reborn Colt, the demon priest with his hand around Dean's throat. "Maybe a little."

"I can help you now, too," she said, anxious.

"Ruby, I'm not going to hurt you, okay?" Sam said. "Not if you'll do just one little thing for me."

"Name it," Ruby answered.

"Get me my army."

 

Ruby left him there, and Sam spent days poring over ancient texts, meditating, drawing spells and sigils on his skin, searching for a way to control the power that spilled from his fingers and his eyes in lightning and storm. The hunters who came for him before he succeeded were scorched to bone, the bones bleached and scattered. The ones who came later were set wandering, their bodies torn and their minds shattered. He felt a little bad about it, but not very. They were trying to kill him, after all.

It took Ruby less than a week to get him the army Azazel promised, thousands of demons who looked to Sam as their John the Baptist, heralding the messiah, and demons who were sure he _was_ their Messiah. Sam hated them all equally and they knew it, but they no longer remembered what love was, and didn't expect it from their savior.

He drew symbols on the Impala in blood and fire, murmuring incantations while Ruby sat on the motel steps eating ice cream and watching. "I can't believe you're taking the car," she said when he was done, and he sprawled next to her, shirtless and sweaty. The sigils had faded to invisibility; the car looked like it had never been touched, but its power made heatwaves in the air.

"I'm sure not leaving it here," he said. "Dean'd kill me. He'd never be happy without it." He shrugged, the concrete scraping his shoulders. "Anyway, it's got so much of our family's blood and sweat in it, it's like it's one of us. If we're gonna be in Hell, it should come along."

Ruby stared at him. "Happy?" she said. "Sam, have you forgotten the part where Hell doesn't know what happiness is?"

He closed his eyes. "Well," he said, "I do."

 

8.

Bobby and Ellen eat in the kitchen now, since it seems like every inch of the dining room that they don't need for sitting or walking is covered in books, boxes, papers. Bobby's even moved his dusty computer down from upstairs. The front panel is off of it, and a spider has built a web just inside. Bobby's started calling it their good luck spider.

He presses his fingers to his eyes and sits back, reaching for his coffee. Three boxes of Pastor Jim's notes on apocalypse myths are spread out in front of him, but so far he hasn't found anything to either help them or to reassure them that he's got it completely wrong and there's nothing to worry about after all.

He's starting to get to his feet for more coffee when Ellen comes in from the living room, snapping her phone shut. "That was Creedy," she says. "He's in Wyoming, near the Devil's Gate. Said everything around it's been burned black, scorched."

Bobby sits down again, suddenly more awake than after a whole pot of coffee. "Is it open?"

"Not even a crack. But," she goes on, "all the graves are, and every single coffin busted and empty."

"Grave robbers?" Bobby asks hopefully.

She shakes her head. "Busted from the inside. He was looking for phone numbers, see if he can find someone to partner up with on this one."

"A whole cemetery full of reanimated skeletons? You'd think that'd make the news."

"Yeah, well, the news is kinda overflowing with weird events these days," Ellen answers. "Maybe they just didn't have room." She takes both their mugs and heads for the kitchen. The coffee pot is nearly empty, and she pours herself the last cup and starts making another pot.

"Speaking of hunters," she calls from the kitchen, "how come you've got me doing your research? Wouldn't this go easier with a real hunter?"

"Yeah, maybe," Bobby answers. "If you can think of a hunter we can trust with this, you sing out. Last I knew, Creedy still thought Kubrick and Gordon had it right."

"Maybe they did," Ellen murmurs, but not loud enough for Bobby to hear, and her own heart winces away from the thought. "What about Winston?" she calls.

"Last time I spoke to Winston," Bobby calls back, "he was stopping by here to see if I knew where he could find Sam. Asked me real nice, too, 'cept for the pistol he had pointed at my head."

Ellen blinks, leans back to see Bobby through the open doorway. "What'd you do?" she asks.

"Told him the truth," Bobby says with a shrug. "Far as I know, Sam Winchester's in Hell."

He sighs, and closes the notebook. "There's gotta be something we're missing. We've been through every damn book in this house and ain't finding diddly-squat."

Ellen hits the brew button and comes back in to sit down across from Bobby, opening the leather-bound volume in front of her to the place she'd marked when her phone rang. From the living room she can hear the tinny voices of the newscasters; the top story is the weather, and the blanket of ashen clouds that's slowly covering the globe. Australia is the only place that still has sunshine, and only about a half a million square miles of that. There's been no rain, no snow. Just a leaden sky and air as still as a held breath, all over the world. They're blaming it for the thirty-two percent rise in violent crime — twelve percent and sixteen percent in murder and rape alone. People are starting to be afraid to leave their homes; the government has started talking about bringing National Guard troops into major cities, but there's war threatening in eight or nine different places and they're dithering.

"Maybe we should be looking for something else," she says.

"Like what?"

She shrugs. "Instead of trying to put together all this arcana or find some complicated spell or something, maybe we should just look for something simple. The answer to a riddle is always so simple once you know what it is." She turns to look at where Bobby's got the prophecy written in big letters and tacked up over the window.

"There he will meet his brother," she reads, doesn't even have to look at it anymore but she still does, like she's hoping for new words to reveal themselves with an answer. "But he will see him as through a darkened glass, knowing only the darkness in him, and his brother will lose himself in shadow. But why would that even happen?" she asks, turning back to Bobby.

"Well, it's Hell," Bobby answers. "Don't leave you much in the way of the good parts."

"And what's it mean, that Sam's gonna cast Dean away from him and go on rampage up here 'cause he's mad about losing his brother? And the only reason he hasn't done it yet," she goes on, recalling earlier conversations, "is 'cause maybe it takes a while for the whole thing to go down. For him to forget he doesn't want to give him up."

Bobby shrugs. "That's the working theory, based on not a whole hell of a lot."

She looks up at him. "What if we could make them see the rest? The good parts, not just these shadows it talks about."

"What do you wanna do," Bobby asks, "send 'em a Hallmark card?"

"I don't know how, Bobby," Ellen says, shoving away from the table. Her coffee sloshes onto dark wood and she curses softly, snatching up the papers in its path and moving them to safety. The table's already stained with sweat-rings from a lifetime of ice tea glasses, sodas, beer bottles, but she still doesn't like adding new ones. "But since we're not finding anything else," she goes on as she stomps off to the kitchen for a towel, "maybe we oughta look for something. Just some simple thing to get 'em their memories of each other back. Could we summon one of 'em, do you think? Or both of 'em?"

"They're not demons," Bobby says, but his eyes are narrowing. "Least I don't think so, and even if we could, I don't think talking to 'em would help a lot. But you remember that amulet Dean always wore?"

Ellen nods, back and sopping up the spill. "Yeah, little bronze thing, wasn't it?"

"I gave it to Sam when he was just a kid, to give to John for his Christmas present. It ain't much," he says, twisting in his chair and scanning the bookcase behind him. "Just a little thing — here," he says, pulling out a slim volume and paging through it. "Ebben's Book Of Charms And Potions. It's kitchen magic, mostly, but there's one I liked. S'posed to save up the good memories and feelings of the wearer, so if he... here: 'If he doth languish, the charm will restore him, and if he doth fall into melancholy, he shall be encouraged by it.'" He shrugs. "I put the charm on the amulet, and Sam gave it to Dean instead of John. Sam doesn't know about the charm — he doesn't know what the amulet does, just told him it was special. Kinda forgot about it myself 'til now."

"So, what," Ellen says. "Dean puts it on and then he remembers everything? Could that work?"

"Might, but if Sam's the one with the power down below, I'm thinking we've gotta figure out how to get all those memories into him. It won't work for anyone but the owner."

"Well is there another spell we could put on it or something?" Ellen asks, but Bobby's already heading for another bookcase, runs his finger over the spines 'til he finds the one he wants.

"Yep," he says, heaving it out and bringing it back to the table. "A transference spell should do it."

Ellen watches, thinking about it while Bobby works. She knows there's demons and spirits to find missing objects, whatever plane they're on. She knows there's ways to get things down to Hell, though she's not real sure about the prospect of getting anything into Sam's very hand.

"Hey, Bobby," she says after a while. "How do we know Dean doesn't have it with him already?"

"No way he's got it down there," Bobby says. "Even if there wasn't any charm on it at all, that little hunk of metal'd remind him of everything he's ever loved. They wouldn't have let him keep it, no chance."

Ellen turns away, reaching for her coffee. The idea of those boys in that place, it chills her blood. Neither one of them should be there at all, and if God was paying attention, neither of them would be. She says a silent prayer for them both, just in case God's listening now.

 

9.

The incubus pushes Dean's head back, driving into his throat 'til Dean's choking and struggling, glaring up at him and jerking against the chains that bind his arms. When he bites down with a snarl, the demon just laughs, slamming into him so hard Dean feels something in his jaw pop painfully, and then it's coming with a groan, so much bitter spunk that it leaks from the edges of Dean's mouth to drip down his jaw in burning tracks.

It pulls out and cracks its sharp-nailed hand across Dean's face, and Dean goes sprawling, jerks his legs in fast in case the bastard kicks. "Sidonay will hear of that," it says, stroking its ill-formed member gently.

"Ah, you loved it." Dean rolls over and spits blood and spunk.

"Yes. But you did not know that I would," the incubus says. It sounds like it's speaking a strange language through a mouthful of raw meat. "You will suffer for it."

The door closes behind it and Dean spits again. "Man, the clientele in this place sucks," he grumbles.

"No," a silky voice says, "I'm quite certain that the only creature sucking in this room is you, Dean."

"Sid!" Dean struggles up and leans against the wall. "Hey, any word on my transfer request? This place is a freakin' hell-hole."

"Tch." Sidonay shakes his heavy head. "Your arrogance would have brought you here even if you hadn't struck the bargain yourself." He gestures, and two nameless demons step through the door behind him. "And since you chose to use those pretty teeth on a guest, they'll be taken from you."

"Wait, what?" Dean shakes his head, scooting backward and panic rising as the demons approach. "Sid, now, don't do something you'll regret. My smile's half my charm! And Sam! You don't wanna piss off—"

Sidonay speaks a word and Dean's voice is abruptly stopped. "Your brother gave you to me to learn humility, and obedience," he says. "How I teach you is entirely up to me." He smiles, and touches Dean's lower lip. "And your _mouth_ , when it isn't speaking, is half your charm, lovely, and it will still work quite well for the only thing it's good for here."

Dean struggles, mouthing curses as the demons drag him to his feet, but Sidonay doesn't return his voice to him until he's strapped into the chair with the bit forcing his jaw open, and then only to hear him scream.

 

10.

Sam's lounging on the throne, his feet propped up on one of the human slaves who haven't yet figured out where they're going. The slave is naked, gagged, on his hands and knees. There's a long ribbon tied to his balls, and Sam tugs it occasionally as he thinks. At the foot of the dias, Ruby sits at a largish desk with a stack of paperwork in a box and something that looks like a computer if computers were made of embers and stone and flesh.

"So what you're telling me," Sam says, "is, first, that souls that come to Hell are here because this is where they think they belong, and we're mostly just here to make sure they get what they think is coming to them?"

"And to make sure none go missing," Ruby says.

"And if they didn't believe they belonged here?"

Ruby shrugs. "That's the big secret no one's supposed to know. They're only here because they think they should be."

Sam scowls thunderously. "So white supremacists, for example, get to go to heaven 'cause they think they're doing the right thing? That's fucked up."

"Not as much as you'd think," Ruby says. "Once they get there, they're made to understand how wrong they were, and the suffering they caused." She smiles, sharp little teeth. "They usually wind up down here not long after."

Sam nods, thinking that over. "So the trafficking in souls," he goes on after a moment, "that's just so that minor demons—"

"And some of the bigwigs," Ruby adds.

"—can have house pets, slaves, whatever?"

"Pretty much," Ruby says.

"And second," Sam goes on, "that since Dean killed Azazel, _no one_ has been keeping up with the paperwork and we have no idea where any of the new souls are?"

She shrugs again. "That's sure how it looks. I can't find any records more recent than that date, and I can guarantee you that souls have been arriving daily, just like always."

Sam sighs, and moves his feet, gives the slave a vicious kick and the slave's cry is muffled as he goes sprawling. A snap of his fingers and the slave's gag is gone. "You," Sam says.

The slave prostrates himself at Sam's feet, and Sam obligingly puts his foot on the back of the slave's neck. "Are you here because you _want_ to be tortured for eternity?"

"I— I'm here because I'm a sinner," the slave says, his voice shaking and tearful. "I rejected God, and now God has rejected me."

"But you heard what she just said," Sam points out. "You don't have to be here at all. All you've gotta do," he says, and leans forward, watching the slave intently, "is stop believing you belong here."

The slave buries his face in his arms, his shoulders shaking. When he doesn't leap to his feet and do a little dance, or vanish into the air or something, Sam guesses he's crying, not laughing.

"Huh." Sam snaps again and the gag is back in place, and he tugs the ribbon sharply. "Where's my fucking footstool?" The slave scrambles onto his hands and knees, and Sam props his feet up again.

"Dean's a fornicator, a sodomite, a murderer, a blasphemer," he says. "And he sold his soul. I really oughta throw him out or start doing a better job torturing him myself. Wouldn't want to disappoint my big brother."

Ruby nods absently. "Listen, Sam," she says, scanning a folder. "There's some things going on upstairs, I didn't know if you'd want to know about."

"Things like what?" Sam asks.

"Um, well, there's some demons from one of the lower levels that've gotten out and they're digging up corpses and reanimating them. It's causing some havoc here and there. A minor influencer demon is making some serious waves at the U.N., it looks like it's trying to get a third world war going, keeping people pissed off and not talking. The sun's been blocked out and people are starting to freak about that, and—"

Sam waves his hand. "Whatever. The more they kill up there, the more fun we have down here, right?"

Ruby glances at him, then shrugs. It wasn't her decision to set him up down here, and it's not her problem how he decides to run the place. Everything serves the plan, after all, or that's what Uriel told her, and what, she's going to start calling Uriel a liar? "Sure thing, boss," she says.

 

11.

Dean's sitting awake in his cell that night when Sam slips in to see him, shadowy in the dimness. Dean glares at him, but he doesn't want to hear what words would sound like through his ruined mouth so he keeps his cursing to himself.

"Let me see them," Sam says, and Dean dutifully bares the nubs of his new teeth, still glaring. It's taken hours just to get them this far and Dean's protective of them.

"You know," Sam says, sitting down beside him, "Baal wants those. He asked me for them, said they're like baby teeth and he hasn't had any new since people stopped burning their children for him."

Dean makes a non-committal grunt, and Sam grins, dimpling. "Don't worry," he says. "He should never have asked. He's regretting it now."

Dean scoots back on what passes for his bed and leans against the stone wall, watching Sam.

"So what do you think of the place?" Sam asks, his glance taking in the whole of Sidonay's brothel. "Is it as nice as places you went back home?" Dean just growls, and Sam laughs, and it's not a nice sound. "You know I watched you earlier, with some of the demons," he says. "I can do that — I'm god down here, no part of Hell is secret from me." He turns a sly smile on Dean. "That thing the Pishacha did," he says, "with the cross and that silver knife and the big stone dildo," and Dean's stomach lurches. "That was hot. I think I'm gonna try it if I ever let you back into the palace. I thought for sure Sidonay would give you a day to get over that, but what was it, half an hour later he gave you to a couple of Abigor's lieutenants, right? One of 'em had that thing in his mouth instead of a tongue?"

Dean draws in a silent breath, willing himself to forget the last few days just like he's forgotten most of his life upstairs, and he doesn't say anything.

After a while, Sam seems to collapse a little, subsiding in on himself, and he plucks at a thread on the coarse blanket. "You know this is made from the hair of adulterers," he says, lifting a corner. "First thing they do when they get an adulterer down here is shave it clean, and they collect all the hair and weave it into whips. What's left, they do stuff like this with. Waste not, want not, I guess."

Dean doesn't answer, methodically tucking the tip of his tongue into the groove of each new tooth, one after the other. The flesh is tender, tastes of copper. He wonders how that works, since he's dead now.

"I wish you'd just say you're sorry, Dean," Sam says after a while. "I don't like leaving you down here, letting other people play with you." Dean grunts again, dismissively, and Sam laughs. "Yeah, okay, not people, exactly. But what am I supposed to do? Dean." He looks up, and his eyes are soft, bright. "You tried to kill me. _Three times_." He shrugs, picking at the blanket. "Abigor said I should just toss you into the Pit and forget about you. I almost killed him for it, but he's not really a bad guy. Just a little too gung-ho, with the strategy and the 'what will people think' and everything."

Dean watches him as he talks, trying to remember what it was like when they were up above. The two of them, the sun gleaming off the Impala's chrome while she ate up the miles, and Dean telling one filthy joke after another trying to make Sam blush and Sam laughing, and laughing. He tries to hold onto the memory, but it feels like a story someone told him once, that happened to two other people.

"Hell's going to shit," Sam is saying, and laughs, shaking his head. "Yeah. Hell's going to shit. Ruby's supposed to be getting an inventory of souls so we can figure out who's where, and it turns out—"

But then he stops, and looks at Dean, and Dean resists the impulse to show off his new teeth again.

Sam looks away. "I'm losing you, Dean," he murmurs. "I got us stuck here so I'd never have to lose you, and now I'm losing you, and I don't know how to make it stop."

 _You're the King of Hell,_ Dean wants to say. _Figure it out._ But he doesn't, and after a while Sam stands and unzips his jeans.

"Well," he says. "While your new teeth are still so tiny, we oughta take advantage of it, don't you think?"

When Sam pushes into his mouth, the slick feel of his cock sliding over his gums makes Dean want to vomit. He'd done that his first night in Hell, though, and Sam had had him whipped bloody and then had done something to him so now he can't. It just rises in his throat and chokes him while Sam fucks his mouth. It doesn't stop him from getting hard, though, or from coming when Sam slams deep into him and shudders, spilling into the bile in his throat.

After Sam leaves, Dean stretches out on the stone bed and stares up at the ceiling, tucking the tip of his tongue into his new teeth until the guards come for him again.

 

Two days later they move Dean back into Sam's quarters, into a shiny new cage made out of gold. There's with a real bed inside it, and Dean sprawls out on the silk-sheeted mattress with a groan and burrows into the pillows. Then he flops over to stare at the ceiling, touching his new teeth, fully grown in now, with his tongue. Then he counts the bars, starting over when he loses track. Then the stripes on the pillows, then the tassels on the curtains, the lines on the floor.

After a while he starts humming to himself, but he can't catch the tune, can't quite find the lyrics. "Mmm-du-dmm-dmm-mm, this whipping boy done wrong," he sings softly, "deprived of all his...thoughts.... What I've felt, what I've known...."

He shakes his head, pushing to his feet. He can remember the steering wheel under his hands, and the sound of the cassette tape snicking into the player. He knows Sam was there. He must've been, Sam was always there. Except...not always. He scrubs his hands over his face. Sam's losing Dean, and Dean's losing Dean, everyone's losing Dean, and Dean's losing Sam. Maybe Sam's already lost.

It's all going to shit. He kicks the door of the cage and it clangs, the bars shuddering. But Sam never comes, and finally Dean wraps himself up in velvet blankets and tries to sleep.

 

12.

Sam opened the Devil's Gate and drove the Impala straight through into Hell, and the demon army that waited for him scrambled to keep out of its way. The sigils glowed like fire on its black body and its chrome, and Sam was alone in the car; Ruby couldn't come near it without starting to bleed from her eyes and her mouth.

With Sam in the Impala at its head, the army advanced on a fractured opposition led by squabbling generals all jockeying for power in the vacuum left by Azazel's death; it was almost laughable how easily Sam's army tore through them. With Sam's power surrounding it and the sigils blazing, the Impala was a tank, and Sam drove it like one, crushing any demon that stepped in front of it on his way to the center of Hell, to the palace where Ruby had told him Dean would be.

Time works differently in Hell, she had said. Do it right, and he would arrive the same day as Dean.

He drove the Impala through the gates of the palace, and they burned as he passed. The tires had trouble grabbing traction on the slick stone floors, so Sam eased it to a stop outside the throne room. The place seemed empty of demons; only Ruby dared to follow him in, and any that had been there had fled or were hiding in the lower levels. The door of the Impala opened with its usual squeak, and Sam thought again he should get some WD-40 for that as he stepped out of the protection of the car, and that was the last thought he had before the memories came slamming back, staggering him.

"Sam!" Ruby reached for him, but couldn't come close. He dropped to his knees.

Azazel was watching as a demon pulled the flesh from Sam's back in strips, laid each strip on coals in front of him to sizzle. "We can keep doing this forever," Azazel said. "You'll grow it back and we'll take it off, and when that stops being fun, we'll give your entrails to feed the dogs while you watch, pull your eyes out and fill the sockets with poison, stuff your mouth with your own feces. Oh, and your brother'll be watching from heaven for all eternity. His own special kind of hell, and won't that just be a kick in the head?"

"Or," he said brightly, "you can take my offer. You get Dean, I get you, everyone goes home a winner." The demon poured gasoline over Sam's back and he screamed. "Offer's on the table," Azazel said. "And I can do this forever."

Days, years, an eon in the Pit with Azazel and his torturers, and all of it swam in his mind like oil and blood when he stepped out of the car into Hell. Everything, right up to the moment when Sam said yes and Dean made his deal. Everything after that was blurring like smears on a window.

When he looked up again and found Ruby reaching for him, his eyes blazed fire, and he smiled.

 

13.

"The thing about demons," Bobby explains as he chalks the symbols onto the big concrete square outside the garage where he usually works on cars if the weather's nice, "is that some of 'em used to be angels. And some of _them_ wish they were again."

Ellen's sitting on the hood of an old Pinto with a beer in one hand and a book in the other. She holds it open to a page with symbols on it, and the word "Avnas" at the top. Dean's double-charmed amulet waits in a silk pouch in her pocket.

Bobby glances at the book, then goes back to his drawing. "So what we have here," he goes on, "is one little task that can get a demon in good with both the head honcho in Hell by giving him his brother back, and the guy upstairs by stopping the apocalypse, both at once. Now that's not something you run across every day."

"Well, you're the demon expert," Ellen says, and nods towards the chalk design. "Just tell me that thing'll hold a demon as old as that."

"Oh yeah," Bobby says, nodding. "Yeah, that part's no problem."

Ellen narrows her eyes at him. "So what part's the problem?"

Bobby laughs. "The part where we convince it to take an amulet back to Hell and hand it to the guy who took Lucifer's old job."

"And he doesn't even need to put it on?" Ellen asks.

"Just has to hold it in his hand for an eyeblink," Bobby answers, "and every piece of Dean that that charm picked up'll go slamming into Sam like a tidal wave."

Ellen frowns. "But what if the demon touches it, or someone else?"

"Don't matter," Bobby says. "Unless I screwed something up real bad, it'll only react to Sam or Dean. We just gotta get it to them."

 

The demon Avnas is a pillar of fire with a voice like blazing embers, and when it sighs, it sounds like the hiss and crackle of chicken skins frying. Or other skins, Ellen supposes, though she doesn't think on it. She keeps well back, tongues of flame licking near the chalked markings but never touching.

"Such a simple task," it says. "You insult me, summoning me here for this."

"No, no," Bobby says, "it's no insult. Think about it. You want the seventh throne back, right? Everyone knows that." The pillar crackles, but doesn't dispute it. "But 'til then," Bobby goes on, "you're stuck in the Pit. So here's a way for you to get on the good side of your new boss in Hell _and_ your old boss in Heaven at the same time."

Fire leaps and even Bobby takes a step back. "Or to have them both at my throat," it hisses. "You're a hunter, I know your kind. You wish me harm, I think."

Bobby snorts. "Yeah, I'm a hunter," he says, "or I used to be, but I don't try to banish demons 'cause it's fun. It's hard work, y'know."

The pillar crackles again. "So I would hope."

"The only reason I do it is so there's fewer demons causin' trouble here on earth," Bobby says. "So if you get back into Heaven, I'd call that a win."

 

Getting the amulet to Sam, however, proves difficult, even for as ancient a demon as Avnas. Nearly every demon of name is lining up to see him, but his bitch is telling them all to fuck off, however old or respected, unless Sam summons them himself. Avnas has to call in three favors just to get a message to him.

She waits for him in an unused antechamber in her human guise, and when he comes, she wonders why the fuss. He looks like a mortal boy, nothing more. But when she meets his eyes, her flame flickers, and she shrinks from him.

"You said it's from _Bobby?_ " he asks without preamble, crossing the floor in long strides.

Avnas takes the box from inside a pouch and offers it to him.

"And Ellen," she says. "Bobby said it was a gift from you to your brother when you were children. He thought you would like to have it back."

"Thanks," he says absently, taking it. He flicks the little latch open and pokes into the velvet folds. When he sees the amulet, she can feel the stutter of his heart; the air trembles with it.

And then he grins. "Avnas, right?" he says.

She nods mutely.

"Thank you, Avnas." He slips the box into his pocket and strides out of the room, and as the door swings shut she hears him laugh, and she thinks she would never like to hear that laugh again. She leaves the palace and doesn't look back.

 

Dean's doing pull-ups on the bars of his cage when Sam comes sauntering into the room. He licks his teeth at the sight of Dean, white teeth that make Dean curl his lips protectively over his own.

"Mmmm. You are a nice piece of meat, Dean, I'll give you that."

Dean snorts, drops from the bars. "Asshole," he mutters. He's too tired for snappy comebacks, hardly slept all night waiting for Sammy, who never showed up until now.

"Is that any way to talk to your own brother?" Sam says. "And here I've got a present for you, too." He pulls out the little box and opens it up, turns it so Dean can see.

Dean's breath hitches, and he reaches for it through the bars, but Sam pulls it back. Dean looks at him sharply. "It's mine," he says. "Give it here."

"Didn't I give you this the first time?" Sam says. "Man, if I'd known then, I'd've given you— I don't know, a brass butt plug or something, you probably would've loved it."

"How'd you get it?" Dean asks, still reaching for it.

"Bobby. No idea how he got his hands on it," Sam says with a shrug.

"Bobby gave it to you?" Dean says, frowning. Bobby, Bobby, he knows he should know that name. It's slipping into his memory and out again like trying to remember a dream.

"Not personally," Sam says. He loops the cord around his finger and pulls the amulet out, dangling it in front of Dean. The cage door snicks open and Sam steps back. "He and Ellen sent a demon to bring it."

Ellen's name pings off of Bobby's in Dean's mind and they both slip into focus as Sam keeps talking. "You used to love this thing," he says, tapping the cord to make the amulet swing. "Second-hand gift meant for Dad. It's not even magic, just some piece of junk Bobby gave to me knowing I wouldn't know the difference, and you loved it like I'd made it by hand just for you. How pathetic is that?"

Dean's out of the cage now, but his mind is racing, the amulet glinting in the reddish light. How would Bobby know Sam was here? And if he knows, he must know why, must know what's happened.

"And you've been kind of an asshole lately anyway," Sam's saying. "What with trying to kill me and everything. I don't think you deserve presents. Well," he grins, "not presents that don't drip down your chin after I give 'em to you."

But what would be the point of going to all that trouble, summoning a demon, making a deal to get the amulet all the way down to Hell and into Sammy's hands? Why would Bobby and Ellen send demon-Sammy, the new ruler of Hell, a gift unless—

"Sam, no!" He lunges for the amulet but it's too late, Sam's already catching it in his hand, and bronze glints between Sam's fingers and his eyes go wide, and he's staring at Dean like he's seeing him for the first time. "Dean," he says, and he takes a step forward but stumbles, his knees buckling. Dean catches him, cursing, and they stagger to the floor.

"Dean," Sam says, holding tight to him, "Dean, I didn't— I never knew," but his voice is strange and thick, and Dean's cursing, prying his fingers open to get to it, and the amulet falls into his palm, and everything comes rushing back.

 

14.

Eight months after Avnas leaves with the amulet, Bobby and Ellen are sitting on Bobby's front porch, watching the sun set. The sky's had only natural and normal clouds for eight months, and plenty of sunshine. People are going about their business like nothing ever happened, and there's no more talk of National Guard, or any more talk of war than is natural amongst humans. The scientific journals are still publishing articles about the freak weather of late last year, but they haven't reached any conclusions. There's consensus is that it had something to do with global warming, but no consensus on what, or what it means.

"So, still nothing?" Bobby says.

"The usual stuff," Ellen answers. "Werewolves, poltergeists, vampires. Enough to keep folks busy. But no more possessions, no more deals, no demonic activity at all. There's rumors that even folks whose souls are coming due, no one's showing up to collect."

She takes the last swallow of her beer, the bottle held loosely between her fingertips, and Bobby nods. "Guess it worked," he says. "Eight months since violent crime started inching lower worldwide. Eight months of things quieting down in the global hot spots, and since the U.N. pulled its collective head out of its collective ass. Eight months of the whole damn planet starting to ease up a little."

Ellen sets the empty bottle down. "What do you think they're doing down there?"

Bobby shrugs, staring out at the road. But if he could have anything in the world right now, he'd see that sweet black Impala rumbling up his driveway with those boys in the front seat, smiling.


	2. Epilogue

Dean's sitting sideways in the massive throne that Sam's had installed beside his own, obsidian and butter-soft red leather. He'd had Dean's throne made into a recliner to avoid just this, but Dean likes this better, his boots tucked neatly beside his throne and his sock feet propped on the arm of Sam's. He pops an M&M into his mouth.

"Dude." Sam glares at him. "Get your stinky feet off my chair."

Dean wiggles his toes.

"I mean it." He shoves them off and Dean laughs, puts them right back on.

Sam huffs a sigh. "God, what'm I gonna have to do, move your chair?"

"Move your own."

"Jerk," Sam mutters.

Dean smirks. "Bitch." He lobs an M&M at Sam and Sam bats it away. It skitters across Ruby's desk at the foot of the dais and she sighs.

"You two are like little kids, I swear."

"So Sammy, you wanna go for a drive later?" Dean asks. "This demon that works at Sid's place was telling me there's a lake of fire a couple miles from here that's freakin' awesome."

"Sidonay," Sam says. "You know he hates it when you call him Sid."

Dean snorts, rolling his eyes. "It's all lava and these," and he sketches a vaguely phallic shape in the air, "these big stone formations. We should go. And hey," he adds. "We never did go to the Grand Canyon."

"There's s'posed to be one down here, too," Sam says. He leans over and digs through a stack of books and papers by his feet, comes up with a map that looks about a thousand years old. "A Grand Canyon, I mean. Like, the whole world is replicated down here or something."

Then he stops and looks at Dean through the thick fringe of his bangs. "You know you don't have to stay, right?" he says quietly.

Dean presses his lips together, looking down, and Ruby slips out of her chair, muttering something about needing another box of files, and makes for the door.

"Sammy, how many times are we gonna have this conversation?"

"It's just — I mean just because I have to stay here doesn't— You could go back, Dean. Go to the _real_ Grand Canyon, live your life, hunt, get married, have—" and he laughs, "—have the anti-Christ's little nieces and nephews. Do whatever. Or you could go on to Heaven," he adds. "You _know_ you don't belong here."

"How d'you figure, Sam?" asks Dean sharply. "Of course I freakin' belong here." He shoves himself to his feet and swings around to stand in front of Sam, leaning on the arms of his throne. "On top of a lifetime of other sins, I sold my soul to bring you back. And you sold yours — or you know, something like that," he says, waving his hand, "on the same deal. Nothing's changed. And hey," he goes on, standing up, "it's not so bad, not with you in charge. You recalled all the demons back from earth," he says, ticking items off on his fingers. "Stopped the soul trafficking. You're fixing the place up, and can I just say, thank you for getting those freakin' heads off the doors." He shudders theatrically.

"Dean, I'm serious," Sam says.

"So am I, those things gave me nightmares. Now come on, get your damn shoes on. My baby needs her exercise."

Finally Sam grins, then laughs, and reaches for his boots.

After all, they've got eternity to hash this out.

"And who knows," Dean says as they cross the room towards an innocuous side door, "maybe we could get...shore leave or something."

"Maybe Bobby could summon us."

"Or we could just show up and scare his dogs."

"And Bobby and Ellen."

"Think those two'll ever hook up?"

"Dean!"

"What, I'm just sayin'!"

The side door opens with a little squeak just as Ruby comes back with the requisite file box, and the last thing she hears as she steps into the throne room is Dean saying he thinks he's got some WD-40 in the trunk, and then "And I'm driving," as the door squeaks softly shut.


End file.
